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Sarah Palin’s Evolving Excuses for Firing Walt Monegan

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As each new event plays out in TrooperGate, I can’t help but shake my sense of deja vu: the scandal is so much like the US Attorney purge I feel like I’ve already seen it before.

Today, that sense of deja vu comes from watching Sarah and the McPalin campaign keep changing the reasons they give for why Palin fired Walt Monegan. Andrew Halcro has a detailed chronology, from which I’ve done this summary:

February 29: Palin "really liked" Monegan, except regarding issues pertaining to her former brother-in-law

July 14: "Wanted to change leadership"

July 21: Palin wanted "more of a focus on trooper recruitment and fighting drug and alcohol abuse in rural Alaska" (though she had offered him a job doing just that)

August 13: Monegan wanted too much money for funding (he was fighting to get the funding the Governor had asked for)

September 15: Monegan had a "rogue mentality" (including, specifically, he went to DC without telling Palin in hopes of getting increased funding to fight sexual assault)

Now think of the changing reasons for the firings in the US Attorney purge:

David Iglesias:

  • Referred to as an "up and comer" in 2004
  • Immediately after the firing, DOJ accused Iglesias of being an "absentee landlord" (which would have made the firing illegal, since Iglesias traveled to serve in the Navy Reserve)
  • Later, they claimed Pete Domenici had asked Gonzales to be fired in calls in late 2005 and early 2006 (in fact, Domenici was asking whether Iglesias had the resources he needed
  • The real reason for the firing appears to be twofold: first, that Iglesias wasn’t prosecuting enough voter fraud (though Iglesias was considered a top expert on voter fraud within the department), and second, that Iglesias wouldn’t indict a top Democrat before the 2006 election

John McKay

  • DOJ claimed they fired McKay because he was insubordinate to Paul McNulty in championing a records-sharing system, LiNX
  • Later, they suggested McKay was too negative when trying to find the killer of one of the AUSAs in his office
  • As late as August 2006, McKay was considered for a federal judgeship
  • The real reason for his firing appears to be his unwillingness to push baseless voter fraud cases

Paul Charlton

  • DOJ complained that Charlton fought to tape FBI interviews in child-molestation on reservations (though they had approved a test program for doing so)
  • Gonzales complained that Charlton challenged one death penalty decision

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What Got Added to the Renzi Indictment Since October 2006?

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I noted earlier that there was good reason to believe that the impending Renzi indictment is the most likely explanation for Paul Charlton’s firing in December 2006. A number of reports described the investigation stalling just before Charlton was fired. That raises the question of whether the investigation has progressed since the time Charlton was fired–or whether DOJ has simply stalled since then.

The chronology of Charlton’s firing and the Renzi investigation

A quick reminder of the chronology:

June 2005: Investigation into Renzi launched

Months before election day, 2006: Investigators ask for clearance to tap Renzi

September 13, 2006: Charlton’s name added to the firing list

Late October, 2006: Wiretap approved and put into place

October 26, 2006: News of the Renzi investigation leaked to the press; this alerts Renzi to wiretaps used in the investigation

Late October 2006: Renzi’s Chief of Staff, Brian Murray, calls Charlton’s office and asks about "pending indictment;" Charlton alerts DOJ

December 7, 2006: Charlton fired

Early 2007: Key witnesses first subpoenaed

April 19, 2007: Renzi’s insurance company raided

April 21, 2007: John Wilkes WSJ article lays out most of charges described in indictment

November 9, 2007: Mukasey assumes AG position

December 17, 2007: Diane Humetewa assumes AZ US Attorney position

February 22, 2008: Renzi indicted

In other words, after stalling the approval of wiretaps in 2006, after raiding Renzi’s business (technically owned by his wife) in April 2007, it still took until today to bring the indictment.

So was DOJ stalling, or were they conducting an ongoing investigation?

What DOJ knew by April 2007

As I point out, by April 21 of last year, the WSJ’s John Wilke was able to describe almost all of the counts laid out in the indictment. He described that investigators had found:

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Rick Renzi Indicted

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From the AP: 

A 26-page federal indictment unsealed in Arizona accuses Renzi and two former business partners of conspiring to promote the sale of land that buyers could swap for property owned by the federal government. The sale netted one of Renzi’s former partners $4.5 million.

Here’s a post describing the deal from last year.

A big time mining venture, Resolution Copper Company, wants a parcel of land an hour east of Phoenix so it can mine the vein of copper that lies beneath it. Renzi offered to help them gain Congressional approval for a land swap that would give them that parcel of land, in exchange for some other pieces of land that would be preserved or used to decrease water consumption in the area. Only, Renzi wanted to throw in a little goodie for himself–he asked Resolution to buy an alfalfa field he owned to include it in the swap. The field was later purchased by another group (with ties to Bruce Babbitt) for $4 million dollars, just two years after it was purchased for $1 million.

Not a surprise, really. I’m just hoping the indictment finally reveals more about why Paul Charlton was fired to stave off precisely this indictment. From last year’s post:

And, lurking behind the scam, is the firing of Paul Charlton as US Attorney. In the Senate hearing the other day, Alberto Gonzales offered no good answer for why Charlton was fired. He claimed only that Charlton resisted Gonzales’ judgement on a death penalty case and that he used poor judgment in his efforts to implement taped confessions for investigations in his district. News of the Renzi investigation first got leaked in October, just before the election. And this scam involves a significant Native American interest (one of the commonalities among several of the fired USAs)–the San Carlos Apache Tribe opposes the mining project because it endangers some of their cultural heritage areas.